Law.com Subscribers SAVE 30%
Call 855-808-4530 or email [email protected] to receive your discount on a new subscription.
Judge Goes Where Governor and Legislature Fear To Tread
Justice Lucindo Suarez took a bold step February 5 when he judicially imposed a rate of $90 an hour for assigned counsel. The decision in New York County Lawyers' Assoc. v. The State of New York, 102987/00, followed a 16-day bench trial held last summer at which 41 witnesses testified. The judge's lengthy opinion admonished Governor George Pataki and New York's state legislature for failing to raise assigned counsel rates since their last change in 1986.
In recent years, the rates for counsel assigned to represent family court litigants ($40 per hour for in-court work and $25 per hour for out-of-court work, with a per-case cap of $1200) have offered little incentive for attorneys to take on such employment. For example, the court noted that at the time of trial, the administrator of the First Department law guardian program had stated that there were approximately 65 active attorneys available but that she would need 325 panel attorneys to adequately staff the assigned counsel needs of the intake parts in Family Courts in the Bronx and New York Counties.
These insufficient numbers, Justice Suarez noted, resulted in denial of counsel to Family Court litigants who, because of their lack of knowledge of the system, often fail to provide the court with adequate information from which to make decisions. 'Immediate court intervention is required in many of these cases,' the court stated, 'including abuse and neglect or child protective cases that concern the removal of a child from the home, juvenile delinquency cases where juveniles are held in custody and domestic violence cases where victims' personal safety is at risk.'
Major Differences In UK, U.S. Copyright Laws
This article highlights how copyright law in the United Kingdom differs from U.S. copyright law, and points out differences that may be crucial to entertainment and media businesses familiar with U.S law that are interested in operating in the United Kingdom or under UK law. The article also briefly addresses contrasts in UK and U.S. trademark law.
Strategy vs. Tactics: Two Sides of a Difficult Coin
With each successive large-scale cyber attack, it is slowly becoming clear that ransomware attacks are targeting the critical infrastructure of the most powerful country on the planet. Understanding the strategy, and tactics of our opponents, as well as the strategy and the tactics we implement as a response are vital to victory.
The Article 8 Opt In
The Article 8 opt-in election adds an additional layer of complexity to the already labyrinthine rules governing perfection of security interests under the UCC. A lender that is unaware of the nuances created by the opt in (may find its security interest vulnerable to being primed by another party that has taken steps to perfect in a superior manner under the circumstances.
Removing Restrictive Covenants In New York
In Rockwell v. Despart, the New York Supreme Court, Third Department, recently revisited a recurring question: When may a landowner seek judicial removal of a covenant restricting use of her land?